Sessions: WH Wants Voters to 'Stay Out' of Immigration

8 Sep 2014

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) railed against President Barack Obama’s decision to delay an executive order granting amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants until after the election in a speech on the Senate floor Monday.

Sessions argued, “President Obama’s announcement Friday that he would not follow through on his promise to utilize executive orders to provide amnesty and work authorization for 5 million to 6 million Americans by the end of the summer who have unlawfully entered the country…does not indicate that he is has in any way abandoned his plan to execute such an executive order amnesty.”

“This is the point the American people need to understand. The president now is brazenly reaffirming in even clearer language that he will carry out his amnesty plan, but only after the election in November. This is an attempt to protect his Democratic Senate candidates. His flack, just a few moments ago, said it would be wrong to inject into the election this issue…the American people have one chance to have their voice heard. the president is talking about unilateral, illegal, action, contrary to American law, to legalize as many as 5 million to 6 million people, and we shouldn’t inject it into the election and the democratic senators and other senators who failed to object to that, they should be protected and not [be] criticized for allowing it to occur? Is that what we’ve gotten to in a democracy? That the president can make this decision, not involve the American people? [Obama’s saying] ‘no, they need to stay out of this. They shouldn’t talk about it in an election. Well, when should issues be talked about, great issues facing America, if not during the election cycle?” he stated.

Sessions further called for Senate Democrats to take a clear position on executive amnesty, saying “I think it’s time for many of these candidates for the senate to be heard explicitly, where do you stand? Do you support the legislation that the house of representatives has passed that would effectively…bar the president from spending any money to execute such an illegal, unauthorized amnesty, or not?”